War heroine Odette was deemed 'too temperamental' for spying

By Chris Hastings

12:01AM BST 11 May 2003

Odette Hallowes, the British spy awarded the George Cross for her work behind enemy lines in the Second World War, was considered too temperamental and stubborn for espionage duties, according to newly declassified government papers.

Personnel files from the wartime Special Operations Executive show that trainers regarded the French-born Hallowes - whose activities helped inspire the novel Charlotte Gray - as not possessing the "clarity of mind" required for spying.

The documents also show that she was almost deprived of her George Cross because she could not prove she had been tortured by the Nazis or that she had refused to betray fellow agents. She was given the medal, the highest honour for acts of courage outside military combat, only after her superiors produced medical records and witness statements in support of her case.

Hallowes, who died eight years ago, was born Odette Brailly in Picardy in 1912. She came to Britain in 1932 after marrying an Englishman, Roy Sansom (She later married a wine importer, Geoffrey Hallowes). She joined SOE in 1942 after responding to a War Office request for photographs of the French coast. Her later exploits, which were also recorded in the 1950 film Odette, seem far removed from SOE's sceptical early assessment of her.

One training report, compiled shortly before she was sent to her Nazi-occupied homeland in 1942, accepts that she has "enthusiasm" but points out: "She is impulsive and hasty in her judgments and has not quite the clarity of mind which is desirable in subversive activity. She seems to have little experience of the outside world. She is excitable and temperamental, although she has a certain determination."

The report adds: "Her main asset is her patriotism and keenness to do something for France; her main weakness is a complete unwillingness to admit that she could ever be wrong."

Hallowes was captured by the Gestapo in 1943 after she and her unit commander, Capt Peter Churchill, were betrayed by locals. During 14 interrogations over two years, Hallowes refused to crack. As part of her torture, her toenails were pulled out and she was branded with a hot iron. The Gestapo eventually gave up and sent her to Ravensbruck concentration camp.

The newly released files provide chilling details of the conditions she endured. At one stage, she was held in solitary confinement a few yards from the camp's crematoria. From her cell, she could hear "the screaming of the victims", says a report. "Ashes, smoke and odour all percolated into the cell and the mental torment of these things nearly drove her mad."

Hallowes was handed over to the Americans in 1945 by a German officer seeking favour from the Allies. Even then, however, her superiors had to fight for her to be awarded the George Cross in recognition of her valour.

A 1946 letter from a War Office official, known only as HBP, to Sir Colin Gubbins, the head of SOE, responds sharply to suggestions that the medal could be awarded only if there were "concrete evidence" that she had refused to speak under torture.

The author writes that such evidence is "impossible to obtain" given that she was interrogated in solitary confinement. "The only witnesses would be the torturers themselves or the Gestapo interrogators," writes HBP. "I hope and pray that these men have long since been shot."

He adds, however, that medical evidence shows she was tortured, while the fact that her colleagues were not arrested proves she did not betray them. HBP ends by asking Sir Colin to sign the George Cross citation so that it can be forwarded to the relevant committee with an explanation of the lack of evidence. Hallowes was awarded the medal later that year.

Sebastian Faulks, whose novel Charlotte Gray was inspired by the experiences of Hallowes and other SOE women, said the papers provided a fascinating insight into the workings of the executive which, he argued, was responsible for many of the problems the agents encountered.

He said: "Mistakes were made during the war and SOE operations were compromised. But, interestingly, these were largely due to errors by the service's own Baker Street HQ rather than the operatives themselves."

Marcus Binney, the author of The Women Who Lived For Danger: The Women Agents of SOE in the Second World War, said: "I think we have to remember that these were frank in-house judgments which were not meant for public consumption. The SOE wanted to be sure these people were up to the task that awaited them."

The SOE's personnel files can be studied at the National Archives, Kew.